19 Years Later Redux
by Rico Perrien
Summary: Four people who are old friends and relations meet on Platform 9-3/4 to send children off to Hogwarts. Not as originally written.


**19 Years Later Redux**

**Disclaimer: **No my initials are not JKR, and I own nothing of the Harry Potter franchise and am making nothing financial from this, because she and her colleagues do. No money being made, at least not by me. I just enjoy spinning yarns.

**Time** – September 1st, 2017. Canon until the 6th last paragraph of the epilogue, then AU. Note that the movies do not qualify as canon (one significant person did not die).

Standing on platform 9 ¾ at King's Cross station, Harry and Ginny Potter had just put their second son onto the Hogwarts Express, with his older brother and his cousin Rose Weasley. For Rose and Albus, this was their first trip to Hogwarts, and both children were at the same time excited and apprehensive.

Standing with Harry and Ginny were Ginny's youngest older brother Ron, and their old school friend Hermione Granger, now either Dr Hermione Granger (at work) or Mrs Weasley at home. Harry, Ron and Hermione had themselves met on their first journey on the Hogwarts Express, and watching the children embark on the great journey had them all reminiscing about everything that had happened to them in the last twenty six years.

Then as the train began to move, Hermione shouted to her daughter, "Rosie, remind your father that he is to floo home right after the welcoming feast. Tell him Uncle Ron and Auntie Lavender are staying over tonight and tomorrow. "

Harry turned to Ron and asked, "Yeah, where is Lavender? I would have thought she would be here with your kids. Every year, you two come down to see the train head off.

Ron shook his head. "This place gets too crowded on Journey Day. Little Frederica is still pretty shy around strangers, although Georgia seems to like having lots of people telling her how cute she is and does she like being a twin, and all that nonsense. Besides, this is a working trip for Lav, so we left the kids with Netty. Anyway, that means that I had the day off to myself, so I thought I'd come along with Hermione to ride herd on Hugo and see Rosie off, and just watch all the kids heading off into the great adventure. Just a bit of nostalgia."

Hermione looked at her brother-in-law and asked, "Netty?"

Ron smiled and said "Yes Hermione, Netty the house elf. And before you get your knickers into a twist, we hired her through a nanny service and she is well paid. She's great with the kids, all nine of them, and with house elf magic, she seems to keep them all entertained while Lav and I are at work, or when I'm on tour with the team."

"Anyway, Lavender was called into Madame Malkin's today and tomorrow. You know that royal princess with the big (cupping his hands in front of his chest, and looking a bit cautiously at the two younger relatives)..ah..., developments? The one the muggle tabloids call the "Royal Witch", so they can get past the press and palace rules about maligning any of the royal family. Well, it turns out they are right on this one. She is a witch, and was privately schooled so the word didn't leak out too far. I don't know if it was Statute of Secrecy concerns, or the family was embarrassed at having a witch in the stable."

"You know Lav always had great fashion sense. Hermione, you complained for years about her and Parvati going on and on in the dorm at Hogwarts. Well, Princess "X" (or the 'Royal Rack' as the girls in the backroom call her), wants a new strapless ball gown, and claims that Lavender Weasley is the only witch at Malkin's she will trust with the final fitting. Seems that Lav has a bit of a reputation for bosom support charms, given her rather extensive personal experience with the need for them."

Harry noticed that Lily and Hugo were blushing brightly at this point (as they both had the bright red hair of one of their parents, their blushing was intensely visible. Both were at the age where they were realizing that their bodies were destined to be used for things that they did not currently understand from their own experience, but that seemed extremely important to grown-ups. The confusion about how they felt about this (and the fact that others were going to 1. Notice, 2. Comment, and 3. Have some decidedly different opinions about) reduced the comfort level with the topic that was being discussed. Hence, the blushing.

At this point Ginny commented, "Every time you have a new kid and she's nursing, I keep thinking that if she was a ship, she would capsize. And every time, she gets a bit bigger. It almost makes me jealous. Last time, when she was nursing 'Ella, I thought she would have trouble standing up – she said that little girl really appreciated the plentiful milk supply."

Harry looked at his first wife and smiled "Jealous? You? You have absolutely nothing to be jealous about."

Since the Wizengamot passed the 'Society Rebuilding Act', which required the head of Ancient and Noble Houses to marry (on pain of confiscation of their property), and if they were the head of more than one House, to have a separate 'Lady' for each House (plus as many concubines as they could manage), Harry Potter had married four times. To the surprise of many, Hermione Granger had not become one of his wives. Ginny, his friend and companion-in-arms during the Voldemort War, was now his companion in his arms at home as well.

The battles against the unfairnesses of the wizarding world were still continuing, but as Harry had been advised by two of his placed fathers-in-law who had experience in covert activities, it is often easiest to hide something in plain sight, and as long as Harry appeared to be following the rules which the powers-that-be had imposed (and it was obvious to any who looked at the SRA that it was specifically written to apply to Harry, and Harry alone, with hopes that successful 'candidates' would have access to the Potter and Black family fortunes and thus maintain their own families' waning status and power) might lull his opponents into complacency. A complacent enemy is vulnerable.

Harry's extended family was at the core of what some of the 'old guard' would call 'sedition', but the family called eliminating the attitudes and bigotry that had made Voldemort possible.

Ginny looked down at her own not inconsiderable bosom, and smiled at her husband. "I'm glad you like them. I _did_ say, 'almost'."

As the four old friends laughed, Ron said "Cedrella definitely takes after her old Dad in that."

Ginny looked at her brother with a wicked Weasley smile and asked, "You mean, your appreciation for her mother's tits?"

As Ron chortled and blushed a bit, he said "Well, I _meant_ having a big appetite. But yeah, I guess that too."

Harry and Hermione look at each other and smiled. Their friend had finally grown past his old insecurities to the point where he could laugh at himself.

At this point, Harry felt that his daughter and his nephew could be used for lighthouses.

"Speaking of which," Ron said, "How about lunch. At the 'Broom and Balls'? My treat."

Harry nodded. "Don't you own that pub?"

Ron nodded. "One of my best investment. A Quidditch bar, with lots of food. As close to heaven as I'll ever get."

Hermione commented, 'Sounds good. We managed to get televisions to work in a magical environment. The B&B had ten tellies all showing quidditch from around the world, all the time. Brings in all the old players from school, and it's about the best advertising for our muggle/wizarding compatible products that we could get. Also, being that about half the quidditch players were girls, it's probably the only sports bar in London where you don't get testosterone poisoning just walking through the door."

Hermione, while working on her baccalaureate degree in chemistry from Edinburgh, also pursued her Mastery in Potions. In her mastery classes, she became closer friends with George Weasley who was also working on his Mastery. Working together on projects, Hermione found in George the respect for her love of learning that she had never received from his younger brother (although they had tried to make it work between them for a short while until it became as obvious to the two as it was to all around them that it was not meant to be). After convocation, George hired her as the director of research for Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes, as he found he was too busy running the chain of their stores all through Europe. Now 'W3 Enterprises' was the leading supplier of wizard-compatible muggle technology, and muggle-compatible wizarding technology in the world, including the SAS and other NATO tactical and security services.

Where Harry Potter had taken his fight with the injustices of the wizarding world into the political arena, George and Hermione had gone for the technical route. Most of their society knew very little of the close ties between the 'Potter faction' in the Wizengamot and W3, and nothing of the covert military and intelligence capabilities of House Potter. Some would soon learn that what they didn't know _could_ hurt them.

As Hermione had continued to work with George, as well as pursuing her studies, they found they spent many late nights working on projects. One thing led to another, and they married. Twenty hours after delivering her valedictorian address after receiving her Doctorate (summa cum laude), she delivered their first daughter.

Ginny grimaced. "Hermione, because of you, I have to put up with the kids having those video games and those little music boxes they wear around everywhere."

Hermione shrugged, and said, "Sorry Gin, but all the muggle kids have them, and so all the magicals want them too, now that we've got wizarding kids becoming aware of all the goodies that they haven't had that muggle kids do. It's business, and damned profitable business too. Just be glad I managed to prevent George from including some of his more extreme ideas. One of his prototypes included charms that turned the listener's face into the face of whoever was singing. There are some _really_ _ugly_ singers out there."

"Ron, can we use the small upstairs room for our lunch. I get enough of those tellies at work, and I really don't need to try talk over ten quidditch matches at once."

Ron nodded. "Sure thing, sis. We have the 'Snape' room upstairs. It's quiet."

Harry looked at Ron with a surprised look on his face. "You named a room after Professor Snape? You hated him, and it took me a long time to convince you he actually had been working for us for years."

Ron nodded. "True, I did hate him, and you did too, if you remember. But when it came out that he was a spy for the good guys, it was too good a pun to miss."

Ginny looked puzzled. "A pun? From you?"

Ron shook his head. "Nope. It was our brainy sister-in-law."

Hermione nodded. "Gin, a spy or an informant is called a 'snitch'. What better name for the smallest room at a quidditch bar?"

Harry smiled as he looked fondly at his old friends. All was not quite well, yet, but they were working on it.


End file.
